Special moves

Every move has a point value associated with it and performing streaks of moves will increase the overall point multiplier. The higher your multiplier the higher your point total as well as your overall star rating for your performance. To help you increase your point totals DJ Hero has a pair of special moves that will help you out. The first is the game's equivalent of Guitar Hero's Star Power, called Euphoria. Activating Euphoria, by pressing the glowing red button next to the effects dial, gives your multiplier a boost by double with a max bonus of eight. The other move is something completely different but extremely fun and it is the Rewind. By playing certain sections of a mix very well the Rewind feature opens up allowing the gamer to spin the turntable backwards and replay a previous section of the mix this time with a double multiplier boost. Mastering Euphoria and Rewind are the quickest ways of maximizing your point potential.

Even if you master Euphoria and Rewind you may still have some trouble on certain mixes and that has a bad effect in rhythm games generally. Failing to do play mix properly will result in an awkward sounding mix and will most likely draw stares from any onlookers you have accumulated. Luckily performing badly in DJ Hero does not result in the embarrassing failure of the song.

No fail

Every mix on every difficulty, including expert, is no fail. The only punishment for performing poorly is the reduced amount of points and stars which will prevent gamers from pushing onwards in the game until they either lower the difficulty or get better. Some gamers may criticize the move as catering to casuals and it is but that is not exactly a bad thing. For me personally the fact that I know I won't fail has allowed me to attempt mixes on higher difficulties than I probably would have if I knew I was going to fail out. Playing through the game I had no fear that playing on Hard or Expert would result in utter frustration and I knew that I would always be able to tone the difficulty down if I needed to accumulate some stars to unlock new mixes.

Unlike Guitar Hero or Rock Band, there is no proper career mode in DJ Hero. Everything in the game is via the main menu dubbed, The Carousel. The Carousel has all the set lists of mixes, many of which are locked out from the beginning until enough stars are accumulated. Set lists of mixes are the biggest unlock in the game but there is also a slew of additional characters, costumes, mix decks, and venues to be unlocked as well. Everything unlocks on a fair and consistent basis but the overall presentation of it all is rather weak. A full on career mode would have better served the game. As it stands the game is kind of a collection of mixes to be played with a few multiplayer, both online and offline, modes thrown in for good measure. I'm sure there is something to be said about the simplicity of the setup but when compared to its rock star siblings DJ Hero feels a little bare bones.

Top grade

From a technical point of view everything looks and sounds fine. Graphically the game borrows a lot from the art style of the Guitar Hero series, with exaggerated and cartoony avatars for the fictional DJ's and a more realistic look to the real life DJ's who have special mixes in the game. On the sonic front the game sounds great, especially if you are listening on a surround sound system. Of course the music needs to be the strongest point in a rhythm game and DJ Hero delivers.

The mixes are top grade material and that makes up for a lot of the presentation issues because these songs are a blast to play and listen to. Featuring over 90 mixes by some of the industry's best and brightest DJ's this is arguably the best soundtrack put together for any music game. Of course that is providing you are the type of person who doesn't mind The Jackson 5 being mixed with Third Eye Blind, Jay-Z with Eminem, Eminem with Beck, Daft Punk with Queen, 50 Cent with Bowie or a slew of others. The music though won't be for everyone and if you are not a fan of hip-hop and club music in particular then you probably should steer clear.

Welcome change

Overall DJ Hero is a welcome directional change for the genre. It may not be for everyone but for those that enjoy this type of music this is an excellent game that will provide plenty of fun for quite some time. It will be interesting to see how Activision and developer FreeStyle Games progress with this idea in the future but until then there is plenty of mixing and scratching to be done.